David Lynch

Much like his body of work, David Lynch often defied tidy description. As a filmmaker it was possibly more instructive to refer to him as a surrealist artist working in the medium of film, rather than...
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David Lynch's latest film, Mulholland Drive, a creepy look at Hollywood, is receiving some effusive praise from the folks who comment on Hollywood's product.
The New York Times' Stephen Holden is not reluctant to call it a "great movie," adding: "Looked at lightly, it is the grandest and silliest cinematic carnival to come along in quite some time: a lurching journey through one filmmaker's personal fun house. On a more serious level, its investigation into the power of movies pierces a void from which you can hear the screams of a ravenous demon whose appetites can never be slaked."
Glenn Whipp in the Los Angeles Daily News concludes his review this way: "It adds up to a movie that is stunning in its power, amazing in its imagery and surprisingly affecting in its message. Mulholland Drive may not convert many people to the David Lynch fan club, but if you're already a member, you'll want to let the experience wash over you again and again. It's an astonishing movie-going experience."
And Roger Ebert in the Chicago Sun-Times describes the experience this way: "This is a movie to surrender yourself to. If you require logic, see something else. Mulholland Drive works directly on the emotions, like music. Individual scenes play well by themselves, as they do in dreams, but they don't connect in a way that makes sense--again, like dreams. The way you know the movie is over is that it ends. And then you tell a friend, 'I saw the weirdest movie last night.' Just like you tell them you had the weirdest dream."

Top Stories
News organizations aired footage of the attacks on Afghanistan as well as a videotaped message from Osama bin Laden despite CNN's exclusive deal with Qatar's Al-Jazeera network, Variety reports. Under the deal, Al-Jazeera must prohibit the use of its footage for six hours before releasing it to other networks. In return, the network gets to use CNN's footage. Rival networks are claiming that Al-Jazeera's footage falls under the "fair use" rule, which allows widespread coverage during national emergencies.
Former Spice Girl Geri Halliwell performed for British troops stationed in Oman on Saturday, Reuters reports. Dressed in military colors, Halliwell entertained the crowd at Camp South in Oman's southern desert, which was turned into an entertainment camp with big screens and tent-bars.
A plane-hijacking scene has been edited out of the French action-comedy Wasabi starring Jean Reno. According to Variety, the scene has been replaced with a more suitable ending.
In Courts
Shannen Doherty will serve five days in a work-release program as part of her sentencing for a drunken driving arrest in December, Page Six.com reports. The sentence comes after the former star of Charmed and Beverly Hills, 90210 was arrested for drunk driving in December.
In General
Anne Robinson, host of The Weakest Link, writes in her new autobiography that her mother was a domineering woman nicknamed "The Duchess." According to Reuters, Memoirs of an Unfit Mother also reveals Robinson's own shortcomings as a boozy mother in the 1960s.
Mary Hart has signed on for five more years as host of NBC's Entertainment Tonight, The Associated Press reports. The contract gives Hart, who has hosted the show since 1982, $5 million a season as well as a more creative role in the show's production, including a possible ET spin-off.
David Lynch has signed on as an executive producer of Cabin Fever, directed by newcomer Eli Roth and starring Michael Rosenbaum. According to Variety, the film is about five isolated friends who contract a deadly flesh-eating virus.
NBC has ordered a script for a half-hour kitchen-based romantic comedy starring Patrick Dempsey, Variety reports. The script will center around a sous chef and his experiences in a restaurant. Matthew Carnahan, a former chef, will pen the script.
NBC will televise Michael Jordan and the Washington Wizards' home opener against the Philadelphia 76ers on Nov. 3. According to PageSix.com, NBC will also broadcast the Wizards' Dec. 1 home game against the Orlando Magic. The network had originally planned the beginning of its NBA television schedule with a Christmas doubleheader.

With all the changes and delays forced upon Hollywood in the last week, there's one little story I read about that's worth mentioning. The terrorist attacks happened right at the tail end of the Toronto Int'l Film Festival. Many celebrities were stranded by the closure of the airports, so as an alternative, Universal Pictures chartered a bus to go from Toronto to Los Angeles and hired two drivers so the bus would not have to stop. Among the passengers was the provocative director David Lynch, whose new film Mulholland Drive premiered at the festival. According to a report on Thestar.com, Lynch also happened to have a film camera with him to film the long trip home. Think about what a fascinating movie that would be, especially with Lynch's skewed perspective. And one, I would imagine, that would garner some attention, if Lynch decides to make something of it. If he doesn't, maybe I can get him to send me a copy anyway.
Hudson skips out on "Girl"
Actress Kate Hudson mysteriously pulled out of her next film project The Girl With the Pearl Earring. I hope it isn't because of the awful title because, Kate, that can always change (a must, in this case). No, those powers that be aren't quite sure why Hudson left the project in the dust, triggering producer Intermedia Films to pull the plug on financing just four weeks before filming was to start. The film is based on Tracy Chevalier's best-selling novel about a maidservant of the 17th century Dutch painter Jan Vermeer and is being directed by Mike Newell. Ralph Fiennes is still attached to star as Vermeer. Even more odd is the fact Hudson pursued this project vehemently and was thrilled to be doing the movie. Will there be lawsuits involved? Perhaps. But make no mistake, producer Andy Paterson is determined to recast and move on. Just change the title, Andy.
Carvey is a "Master of Disguise"
Dana Carvey, where the heck have you been? We've certainly missed you. Wish you were still on Saturday Night Live, but of course, you had to move on--even though your track record in films hasn't been the best in the world. However, we are always willing to give you another chance cause you are one funny guy. But Dana, you've got to choose wisely and from the sounds of your next film, you have not done that. The film, called Master of Disguise, is about a man who finds out his family has been masters of disguise for generations. To save his parents from an evil bad guy, he must quickly learn the family's unique talents from his grandfather. It also stars Jennifer Esposito (Don't Say a Word) as the love interest. Well, that's OK, Dana, it just good to see you back on your feet.
"Bad News" for Forman
Director Milos Forman (The People vs. Larry Flynt) has set his sights on Warner Bros.' Bad News from screenwriter/playwright Doug Wright (Quills), based on a novel from Donald Westlake. The story centers on a career crook, John Dortmunder, who gets involved in an underhanded takeover of an Indian gambling casino. However, he soon realizes that he's set himself up to be ripped off-unless, of course, he can rip off his partner first. Well, from what sounds like a fairly typical doublecross movie, the redeeming factors are the writer and director, each provocative in their own right. And of course, the cast has got to be good for this one to work.
Another video game hits the screen
That's right. These video games are just ripe fruit for the picking by studio execs. Now, it's Sega's popular The House of the Dead horror games that are getting the Hollywood treatment. Looking to start filming mid-January, the story takes place on an island off the coast of Florida that is inhabited by zombies, monsters and creatures who wreak havoc on land, in the air and in the water. To try and stop the insanity, a diverse group of multiethnic college coeds and a Coast Guard officer must get on the island and destroy the evil entity living in the House of the Dead. I can see the teenagers lining up now.
Seagal is "Half Past Dead"
Well, at least Steven Seagal should be--then we wouldn't have to be subjected to any more of his movies. But alas, that's out of my hands. His latest is Half Past Dead from Franchise Pictures, being described as a Die Hard in prison. Wait, wasn't Under Siege Die Hard on a U.S. Navy battleship? Right. This story revolves around a man (Morris Chestnut) who masterminds a plan to infiltrate a high-tech prison in an attempt to persuade a death row inmate to tell him the whereabouts of $200-million worth of gold from an old heist the FBI has never been able to solve. Whew! Seagal plays an FBI agent who tries to stop him. Good luck with that, Steven.

Top Story
The Emmy Awards will be going bicoastal, adding a broadcast from a NBC studio in New York for nominees who do not want to travel to California for the Oct. 7 ceremony. TV academy chairman Bryce Zabel told the Associated Press. "We're reaching out to our friends in New York to give them as much comfort and security as possible."
Birthdays
Rocker John Mellencamp will celebrate his 50th birthday on Oct. 7 at a three-day musical tribute in the singer's home state of Indiana. Even though Mellencamp is not scheduled to perform, more than 20 other bands, including some members of Mellencamp's band will get onstage at the Southern Indiana Center for the Arts in Seymour, Indiana. Proceeds will go to the Farm Aid and the New York Red Cross disaster fund.
In General
Arnold Schwarzenegger and his wife Maria Shriver have donated $1 million to the Twin Towers Fund, founded by Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, to aid victims of the Sept. 11 attacks. "We were inspired by the incredible team of rescue workers, firefighters, police officers and emergency service officials who are the true action heroes in this tragedy." Schwarzenegger, who will join the fund's board of directors, told Associated Press.
MGM has decided to postpone the release of the Nicolas Cage WWII drama Windtalkers from Nov. 9 until June 2002. "We feel certain this great film will be enjoyed by the broadest possible audience during the strong summer play period," Robert Levin, president of worldwide theatrical marketing and distribution, said in the MGM statement. MGM also stated they didn't want to risk a bad showing at the box office when ticket sales are down due to the nation's mood after the Sept. 11 attacks.
Talk show host/comedian Jay Leno performed in Las Vegas to a packed house Saturday, urging tourists to return to the city. Since the attacks, the casinos have been down nearly 40 percent, forcing the casinos to lay off thousands. Leno, whose routine touched on the tragedy briefly, had a solution to eliminating terrorist Osama bin Laden, "Send over (former Playboy pinup) Anna Nicole Smith. She'll get his money. He'll be gone in a week."
David Lynch's Mulholland Drive will top the 39th annual New York Film Festival which opens Friday. Festival chairman Richard Peña told BBC.com: "This year's program is a chance to celebrate the great achievements of some of world cinema's most senior and influential and outstanding emerging talents." Other films will include Wes Anderson's The Royal Tenenbaums, starring Anjelica Huston and Gene Hackman, and Jean-Luc Godard's In Praise of Love.

Actor Richard Farnsworth, an Oscar nominee this year for Best Actor for “The Straight Story,” died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound Friday night in Lincoln, N.M. The oldest actor to be nominated for a Best Actor statuette, Farnsworth was 80.
Farnsworth, who was nominated twice for an Academy Award and was a former stuntman, had been involved in filmmaking for more than 60 years.
Lincoln County Sheriff Tom Sullivan released a statement Friday night saying the actor died at his home in Lincoln, 250 miles southeast of Albuquerque. Police did not release any further details, but Jewely Van Valin, Farnsworth’s fiancée, was at home when he died.
“I was just in the other room and I heard the shot,” she said in a telephone interview with The Associated Press from Farnsworth's home. “He was in incredible pain today. He was going downhill.”
Van Valin said Farnsworth was diagnosed several years ago with terminal cancer, which had left him partially paralyzed, and he struggled with the pain while working on David Lynch’s “The Straight Story.”
“He was very ill in that movie, but phenomenally he made it through. He didn't want the world to know he was sick,” Van Valin said. “He couldn't fight it, and cancer got him.”
At age 79, Farnsworth was the oldest leading actor to receive an Oscar nomination. This year’s nomination was the second for Farnsworth, who was also nominated for the 1978 film “Comes A Horseman.” Actress Gloria Stuart was 87 when she was nominated for Best Supporting Actress for 1997’s “Titanic,” making her the oldest performer ever nominated.
Farnsworth, a Los Angeles native, was a stuntman for more than 30 years and moved into acting at age 57. He appeared in films such as “The Natural,” “Tom Horn” and “Anne of Green Gables.”

No apple pie and coffee for Agent Cooper tonight. The Double-R Diner's been burned down. Yes, Washington state's own Mar-T Cafe -- the stand-in for the Double-R on "Twin Peaks," David Lynch's weirdo 1990-91 ABC series about pie, coffee, Agent Cooper (Kyle MacLachlan) and a dead girl wrapped in plastic -- was gutted in a suspected arson Sunday.
"I have no idea who would burn my restaurant down," Mar-T owner Kyle Tweede tells the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. "Take my money; that's one thing. But burning down the restaraunt affects a lot of people. Why would someone do that?"
Police believe someone did "that" after robbing the North Bend restaurant of $450 in cash. The fire caused an additional $250,000 in damage.
Twede is vowing to rebuild. That's the way Agent Cooper would have wanted it.

As the 300 guests at the Salon des Ambassadeurs dined on a Mediterranean fish plate with assorted mushrooms, Piper-Heidsieck champagne and a Palme d'Or strawberry delight, the 54th Cannes International Film Festival handed out its top honors Sunday.
Jodie Foster, who bowed out earlier this year as jury president, fulfilled her obligation as the closing ceremony's host. The awards were characterized as oddly conventional, with the 10-member jury sticking to more established filmmakers rather than the fresher talent from the 23 films in competition. In contrast, last year's jury came under fire for giving the top prize - the Palme d'Or - to Lars von Trier's controversial and divisive Dancer in the Dark.
The Italian film A Son's Room, about a family that is torn apart by the death of a child, took home the Palme d'Or, representing the first time that an Italian movie had taken the top honor since 1978. Its director and star, Nanni Moretti, raised both fists in the air in victory.
"I have often been told that this film represents a turning point in my career because it is a more adult, mature character. Maybe I'm not interested in caricatures any more," Moretti said in a news conference earlier this week, as reported by Reuters. Moretti has been nominated for the Palme d'Or four times and previously won the award for best director in 1994 for his comedy Dear Diary.
The other big winner of the evening was Austrian director Michael Haneke's film The Piano Teacher, a controversial tale about voyeurism and masochism. French actress Isabelle Huppert won the award for best actress for portraying a cold and sexually repressed woman who is titillated by one of her students, played by Benoit Magimel, who also won for best actor. The film won the Grand Prix award-runner up to the Palme d'Or.
"There are films that frighten you. You think they will take everything away from you, but they give you everything," Huppert said when she accepted her award. "I thank Bach, Schubert and Mozart."
It was not a stellar night for the Americans. The only big win for the United States was the shared award for best director by David Lynch and Joel Coen.
Lynch, whose 1990 film Wild at Heart won the Palme d'Or, picked up the director's award for his moody, noirish drama, Mulholland Drive, originally penned as a TV pilot a few years ago. Starring a cast of unknowns, the story centers on a woman who loses her memory after an accident on the famed winding road in Los Angeles, and finds help in the most unusual places. The concept was a tad too bizarre for television.
"At a certain point you realize you're in with the wrong people," Lynch told the The New Yorker. "Their thinking process is very foreign to me. They like a fast pace and a linear story, but you want your creations to come out of you and be distinctive. I feel it's possibly true that there are aliens on earth, and they work in television."
Coen is a Cannes darling who has won two previous director awards, one for the 1996 Fargo and the other for the 1991 Barton Fink, which also won the Palme d'Or. He scooped up his third director's award for his moody, noirish drama, The Man Who Wasn't There. Starring Oscar winners Frances McDormand and Billy Bob Thornton, this tale, shot in black and white, revolves around a hairdresser whose life is fairly mundane until he discovers his wife is having an affair, and he decides to blackmail the lover. Things appropriately go haywire, as they tend to do in a Coen film.
"Curiously, almost everyone in the movie wears a wig, or a hairpiece," Coen said. "So Thornton, who plays the principal character, is wearing one, James Gandolfini wears one, Tony Shalhoub wears one, Jon Polito wears one ... So the overall effect is that it really transforms the appearance of the actors. You almost don't recognise them."
The opening night extravaganza, Baz Luhrmann's Moulin Rouge, enjoyed major popular and critical success. As did the Dreamworks' animated film, Shrek, now destined to become an animated classic. Neither film was seriously in contention for the top honors.
If the Americans received little in the way of accolades, the Asian contingent at the festival fell flat on its face. Even though there were seven features alone in the Official Selection, only a technical award was bestowed on the Taiwanese sound engineer, Tu Duu-chih, for his work on the two Taiwanese entries, Millennium Mambo and What Time is it There?.
In fact, some festival attendees felt the best films were either made 22 years ago, the director's cut of Francis Ford Coppola's Apocalyspe Now, or still in production, based on the 25-minute product reel for the upcoming Lord of the Rings.
Jury president Liv Ullmann hinted at some tough times during the selection process during her introductory speech at the ceremony, as reported by Variety. Noting that unanimity did not always prevail, her fellow jurors "fill[ed] me with anger." But she added, "we in the jury are still friends." It was reported that jury discussion sessions, which occurred daily, would last several hours, as each juror was required to elaborate on their interpretations of the films in competition.
Melanie Griffith won a lifetime achievement award, which took on a bittersweet quality when a few days before her father had died. In a tearful acceptance speech, she said, "It's hard not to see you out there the proud face of my father. Somehow, I know you're here, Dad, and I know your smile is big and, you old cowboy, I know you're up there saying, 'Why are you wearing that dress?'"
In the parallel Cannes awards, the French film Amour d'Enfance (Childhood Love) won the best film award for the Un Certain Regard sidebar and the Iranian film Zire Noure Mah (Under the Moonlight) won the Critics' Week Grand Prix. Sandrine Veysset's Martha … Martha won the Directors' Fortnight.
Cannes still remains a favorite of Jennifer Jason Leigh, at Cannes to promote her film, The Anniversary Party, in which she co-wrote, co-directed and costarred with Alan Cumming.
"It's the only time I think as actors today you get a sense of what it would have been like to have been a movie star back in the '30s and '40s, when the premieres were really big, and you walk up that red carpet or that blue carpet, and it's just incredible," she told The Associated Press.

The Cannes Film Festival's coveted Palme d'Or top prize was awarded Sunday to Italian director Nanni Moretti's The Son's Room, a critical and audience favorite at the festival. U.S. films, including the weekend box-office openers Shrek and Moulin Rouge, went away virtually prize-less, except for tie-wins by Joel Coen and David Lynch for the director's award. Coen won for his The Man Who Wasn't There, and Lynch won for his Mulholland Drive, originally produced as a pilot for a television series that was turned down. The French film The Piano Teacher received three awards, two for its stars, Isabelle Huppert and Benoît Magimel, and the Grand Prix for director Michael Haneke. The best screenplay award went to Bosnian Danis Tanovic for his No Man's Land, while the Golden Camera, an award that goes to a first-time director, was presented to Canadian Zacharias Kunuk for his Atanarjuat The Fast Runner.

Title

First film, a one-minute color animated loop entitled "Six Men Getting Sick" shown on three skull-shaped screens (based on Lynch's head) to the accompaniment of a siren (date approximate)

Served as creator, executive producer, and director of the premiere of ABC's short-lived (six episodes) "On the Air"

Worked as shop assistant, engineer, janitor, newspaper deliverer, in between studies

"Wild at Heart" won the prestigious Palme d'Or Award at Cannes Film Festival but met with critical disfavor in the U.S.; last feature collaboration (to date) with Frederick Elmes

As a child, lived in Sandpointe and Boise, ID, Spokane, WA, and Alexandria, VA

Executive produced "The Cabinet of Dr. Ramirez"

Directed the music video for Chris Isaak's song "Wicked Game"; song featured in the soundtrack to "Wild at Heart"

Created and illustrated syndicated comic strip "The Angriest Dog in the World"

Helmed TV commercial for the home pregnancy test Clear Blue Easy

Produced and wrote for singers Julee Cruise and Koko Taylor (songs used in his films "Blue Velvet" and "Wild at Heart")

"Eraserhead" released

Created and directed episodes of popular TV series "Twin Peaks" (ABC)

Wrote and presented documentary on Dadaist cinema "Ruth roses and revolver" for British TV series "Arena"

Lent his voice to the character Gus on the Fox animated series "Family Guy" and spin-off "The Cleveland Show"

Earned first Oscar nomination as Best Director for "The Elephant Man"; also nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay (co-written with Eric Bergren and Christopher DeVore)

Helmed the pilot "Mulholland Drive" for ABC; series not picked up; Lynch received additional funding from StudioCanal and shot more footage to create a feature film; premiered at Cannes in 2001 where it shared the Best Director trophy; (released theatrica

Executive produced "Nadja" (and played a small part as Morgue Attendant)

Won acclaim (and second Best Director Oscar nomination) for the controversial "Blue Velvet"

Ran off the road with "Lost Highway," a great-looking but senseless, overlong, post-modern hybrid of film noir and "The Twilight Zone"

Returned to "Twin Peaks" land with feature "Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me" (also co-executive producer); wrote 11 songs

Made first short live-action film "The Grandmother"; received grants that totaled $5,000 by American Film Institute (completed film for $7,200)

Created a series of online shorts "Dumb Land," which were intentionally crude both in content and execution; the eight-episode series was later released on DVD

Began working on first feature "Eraserhead"; first feature collaboration with cinematographer Frederick Elmes and actor Jack Nance

Made short film combining animation and live action, "The Alphabet" as entry in Pennsylvania Academy contest

Made television commercials for Gio, the perfume by Armani(1992), for a coffee drink Coca-Cola markets in Japan (1993), and for Alka-Seltzer Plus (1993); also directed a teaser-trailer used to market Michael Jackson's "Dangerous" album

Directed TV commercials for the perfumes Opium and Obsession

Directed the atypically based-on-fact "The Straight Story," about a man who drove a tractor from Iowa to Wisconsin to reunite with his estranged brother

Summary

Much like his body of work, David Lynch often defied tidy description. As a filmmaker it was possibly more instructive to refer to him as a surrealist artist working in the medium of film, rather than a traditional movie director and writer. With his first self-produced film "Eraserhead" (1978), it was clear that Lynch held a deep fascination with the utterly grotesque residing just below the surface of the everyday. He would use that fascination to his advantage with his second film, the hugely successful "The Elephant Man" (1980), only to be dealt a bitter blow by the disastrous, costly experience of "Dune" (1984). However, with the quasi-autobiographical thriller "Blue Velvet" (1986), Lynch would establish a thematic aesthetic - dubbed "Lynchian" - that he would continue to evolve throughout his career. He also had tremendous, albeit brief, success in television with the series "Twin Peaks" (ABC, 1989-1991), a murder mystery that temporarily tapped into the American zeitgeist. In the wake of the series' end, there were missteps and disappointments for Lynch, such as the exceedingly violent "Wild at Heart" (1990) and the almost universally reviled "Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me" (1992). And yet, Lynch's resolve to make his films his way remained resolute. As did his ability to confound and surprise audiences, exemplified by films like the truly mind-bending "Lost Highway" (1997) and the heartfelt "The Straight Story" (1999). Moving into the 21st Century, Lynch continued to defy conventions - as well as traditional narrative structure - with films like "Mulholland Dr." (2001), even as he contributed voice work for a cartoon sitcom, delivered the daily Los Angeles weather report on his personal web site, and filmed an info-movie for Christian Dior - very Lynchian, indeed.

Collaborated in "Twin Peaks" series and film, "Lost Highway" (1997), and "Mulholland Dr." (2001); Married May 10, 2006; Filed for divorce in June 2006, one month after getting married; Divorced Feb. 12, 2007

Education

Name

Corcoran School of Art

Center For Advanced Film Studies, American Film Institute

Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts

Boston Museum School

Notes

When Lynch was a child, his father used to drive him into the deep woods, drop him off, then go to his job as a scientist for the Forest Service. He would leave young David completely alone, surrounded, as the filmmaker once told Time magazine, by "the most beautiful forests, where the trees are very tall and shafts of sunlight come down in the mountain stream and the rainbow trout leap out."

Lynch's interest in furniture making started at an early age, when he hung around his father's wood shop, learning how to use tools and mastering the fundamentals of building. Though he often built furniture for his movies, his first professional efforts at marketing his furniture came in the early 1990s when he sold a tiny expresso table (priced at $600) through Skankworld, a vintage furniture store in Los Angeles. He showed his attractive Club Table, an effective marraige of wood and steel, which comes with special recessed areas to hold drinks, at the prestigious Salone Del Mobile in Milan and had an agreement with a Swiss Company to produce his pieces on a limited basis.

About the failure of "Wild at Heart" and "Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me": "When you love something and feel you've done it correctly, then negative criticism doesn't hurt so bad. I love those movies. But in order to say you're successful, a film has to make quite a lot of money, and I haven't really done that. If I was successful in that way, I'd be...I don't know, making pictures maybe more within the system." – Lynch to Rolling Stone, March 6, 1997

Lynch launched a members-only web site at www.davidlynch.com in December 2001.

He served as president of the jury at the 2002 Cannes Film Festival.

Lynch, along with Mel Brooks, received an honorary degree from the American Film Institute on June 13, 2012.